Tag: Mauricio Rua

Sometimes we hate being right. Last night on Twitter, we predicted Ovince St. Preux would run through Mauricio “Shogun” Rua without effort. We had no idea how prescient our tweet would be.

As you can see above, OSP dispatched the Pride legend without even exerting himself. It only took 34 seconds. To make it worse, Shogun absorbed a ton of unnecessary damage as Mario Yamasaki let OSP batter the Brazilian’s skull. Such slack-jawed gawking aside, this fight was entertaining for the violent spectacle that it was. OSP isn’t a man to write off, and Shogun definitely needs to retire in this point.

There were some other fights last night as well, but they weren’t really anything to write home about (and if you did wrote home about them, you’d get a reply that’s like “What are you talking about? Who the fuck are these people?”). But in case you’re one of the TRUE HARDCORE ULTIMATE BAD BOYZ who comments about how much we hate MMA on our Facebook page, we’ll post the card’s full results. Check them out after the jump.

Note: Due to the McCall-Lineker cancellation, our man Alex Giardini will be providing a play-by-play for only the main event, and filling in results and GIF-links for everything else, saving you from the hassle of watching a likely garbage-ass South American card that’s sure to go past your bedtime. We’re taking the bullet for this one, because we love you so much.

The FOX Sports 1 main card kicks off at 10:30 p.m. ET / 7:30 p.m. PT, so follow us after the jump, refresh the page every few minutes for all the latest results, and toss in your own thoughts in the comments section or on twitter @cagepotatomma. Thanks for coming.

Before you get too excited — no, Silva and Rua will not be fighting each other at the end of the season. (Bummer.) So instead of using the show to hype up a rivalry, they’ll focus on passing on knowledge to younger fighters. As Silva stated in a press release:

“I think I can offer this next generation of Brazilian talent real insight into what it takes to succeed in the UFC. I will bring everything I know about the martial arts, and my own values of what it means to be a martial artist, to my team.”

The UFC confirmed over the weekend that a light-heavyweight battle between Mauricio “Shogun” Rua and Jimi Manuwa will serve as the main event of UFC Fight Night 56, November 8th at the Ginásio Municipal Tancredo Neves in Uberlandia, Minas Gerais, Brazil. It will be the first UFC event held in Uberlandia, which is one of the most badass city-names I’ve ever heard.

Rua is coming off his third-round TKO loss to Dan Henderson in their rematch at UFC Fight Night 38 in March. The loss dropped Shogun’s overall UFC record to 6-7. On the bright side, all six of his wins in the Octagon have come by KO/TKO, which sort of makes him the Roy Nelson of the 205-pound division. Meanwhile, Jimi Manuwa suffered the first loss of his career at UFC Fight Night 37 when he was TKO’d by Alexander Gustafsson. In 15 professional matches, Manuwa has still never seen the third round of a fight.

( *sigh* They just don’t make squash matches like they used to. Photo via Getty.)

How good can a fight *really* be if it ends quicker than Michael Bisping’s prom night? That’s just the question we’re trying to answer this week, and we’ve got a whole slew of special guests to help us: Sydnie Jones of WomensMMA (making her second CP Roundtable appearance), Tim Burke (formerly of BloodyElbow), MiddleEasy Editor-in-Chief Jason Nawara, and MiddleEasy writer Nick Robertson. The topic: What is the Greatest One-Minute Fight of All Time? Join us for yet another thrilling CagePotato Roundtable, won’t you?

Coincidentally, Silva vs. Leben synchronizes perfectly to my favorite under-a-minute song of all time, “Wasted” by Black Flag, which is officially listed at 51 seconds, but includes about two seconds of dead air at the end. For your convenience, I’ve overlaid the Silva vs. Leben fight with “Wasted” in the video above, so you can see what I mean.

The whole thing is fast, dumb, and violent, just like MMA at its best. And when Leben collapses to the mat at the end of the fight, as Keith Morris shrugs off the final line “I was wasted,” it’s such a perfect summary of Leben’s persona. He’s reckless, self-sabotaging, often intoxicated, always driving forward with no regard for the consequences. He’ll wake up the next morning with a massive headache, take a couple bong rips, and go skateboarding without a helmet, because fuck it, if it’s your time to go it’s your time to go.

It’s the halfway-ish point of the year, which means that we are a mere six or so months away from handing out our annual Potato Awards in categories such as “MMA Fail of the Year”, “Media Shill of the Year”, and the always coveted “Krazy Horse Bennett Arrest of the Year.” But because you Taters have been good this year, we’re going to allow you to open one present early: Our definitive ranking of the best UFC brawls of the year, so far.

To repeat: This list is only dedicated to the best *brawls* of the year, which implies a fight in which both participants take their fare share of licks. TJ Dillashaw vs. Renan Barao was a one-sided beatdown, albeit a brilliant one-sided beatdown, and therefore bears no mention here. Except that I just mentioned it. God damn it.

Let’s just get to the top 10 brawls of the year, nearly all of which contain links to full fight videos for your viewing pleasure…

A classic example of two guys with more heart than brains (or defensive capabilities) leaving it all in the octagon, Kevin Souza vs. Mark Eddiva opened up the FS1 prelims for the TUF Brazil Finale in a huge way.

Watching Souza vs. Eddiva was kind of like watching two women play Tekken for the very first time, in that both fighters only seemed to understand how one button on their controllers worked — for Eddiva it was leg kicks, for Souza it was the overhand right. These two techniques were traded with absolutely zero setup for two highly entertaining rounds, earning both men a $50,000 “Fight of the Night’ bonus in an evening of otherwise unmemorable decisions and memorable-for-all-the-wrong-ways squash matches. It was Souza, however, who walked away from the fight victorious via an always rare standing TKO.

- Dan Henderson vs. Mauricio “Shogun” Rua 1 defeated Forrest Griffin vs. Stephan Bonnar 1, with 55.6% of the vote. And so, a recent epic replaces an older one in the pantheon of all-time great MMA fights. Had to happen eventually.

- Don Frye vs. Yoshihiro Takayamadefeated Anderson Silva vs. Chael Sonnen 1, with 52.8% of the vote. I’m surprised it was this close. Kudos to Silva vs. Sonnen 1 for making it competitive, and for their scrappy underdog run in this tournament overall.

So which fight deserves to call itself The Greatest Fight in MMA History — Henderson vs. Rua 1 or Frye vs. Takayama? Vote now, and come back on Wednesday when we reveal the winner!

I was reminded of something on Sunday night. Not only that I haven’t been to church in decades, but also that it can really hurt to be a fan of a specific fighter. I felt a sense of anger, sadness, and frustration when Mauricio “Shogun” Rua was knocked out by Dan Henderson. I haven’t felt that in years, not since June 26th, 2010, when Fedor Emelianenko suffered his real first loss. That night, I realized it may be better to be a fan of the sport of MMA, and not of individuals. Don’t get me wrong, I still have my favorites, but I try to look at every fight objectively and analytically.

It’s difficult not to put feelings and emotions into a fighter’s performance, because fighting is such an emotional sport. Fighters can’t always win, and don’t compete often. If seeing your favorite guy or gal win makes you happy, and watching them lose makes you sad, you could be in for one hell of a roller-coaster ride.

Being a fan of a fighter is not like being a hockey fan. The Red Wings can lose 15 games in a row and they could still go on a winning streak and make it to the playoffs. No big deal, they have a chance one or two times every week to start over. Not so much in this sport.

Dan Henderson and Mauricio “Shogun” Rua fought for the second time last night in Natal, Brazil, and though we weren’t treated to another five-round dogfight, the rematch turned out to be nearly as incredible as their first meeting. This time, it was Henderson who was getting beaten up in the early rounds, as an energized Shogun Rua came close to finishing the American legend on more than one occasion. It seemed like Henderson’s heart, experience, and still-solid chin were the only things keeping him alive going into round three. And then…boo-yah.

All it took was one right hand directly across the chin to snap Shogun’s head back and send him into a backwards somersault across the mat. Arguably, referee Herb Dean could have stopped the fight as soon as Shogun went ass-over-teakettle, but he allowed Hendo to follow up the knockdown with some controversial blows to the back of the head, as Shogun groggily clung to Henderson’s leg. To those of you who expected Herb Dean to penalize Henderson during the finishing sequence: You haven’t been watching MMA for very long, have you?

The Pepey/Lahat KO was just one of five matches at UFC Fight Night 38 that ended in the first round. Notably, middleweight vet CB Dollaway TKO’d TUF Brazil 1 winner Cezar “Mutante” Ferreira in just 39 seconds with an impressive display of counter-punching, which you can watch below…

This Sunday at UFC Fight Night 38 in Brazil, Dan Henderson and Mauricio Rua will meet in a rematch of one of the greatest fights in UFC history. Their first bout went down back in November 2011 at UFC 139, and featured five rounds of mutual abuse that was more like a two-man demolition derby than a professional MMA fight. In the end, Hendo earned a unanimous decision with 48-47 scores from all three judges — although it would have been a different story if the fight was scored under Stockton Rules.

Still, if you’ve been a fan of Henderson and Shogun’s long, decorated careers — and if you consider yourself an MMA fan, it’s pretty likely that you idolized at least one of these guys at some point — it’s not a bad free fight for a Sunday evening. Check out their epic first match below and shoot us your predictions for Shogun vs. Henderson 2 in the comments section.